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Monday, July 20, 2015

Hot Dogs in the Middle of Nowhere and a Horse Named Dawson

I'm taking you back in time a bit,to the end of June. We had been staying on a fellow Roadtreker's property in the Annapolis Valley and he thought we might be able to find a boondocking spot with an ocean view down in Port George. So after our first night on his property we set out the next day in search of the little town park to see if we could do some stealth camping !

Well, Paul never told us how sweet and lovely the village of Port George was. As we came down off the hill and out of the curve we discovered this little seaside village and immediately became enamored with it.

Everyone on this road either lives on the water or has a spectacular view of the water-what a place to live.

Not only do you have the ocean in your back yard but you have this gurgling brook going by your house-just lovely.

We thought this was the village church and I guess at one point it was but it had been converted into a house. What we learned later in the day was that the owner had been recently killed in a motorcycle accident and the church was up for sale. Everyone we spoke with was saddened by his unexpected death.

We passed this sign while in search of the town park. We did find the town park, unfortunately we weren't going to be able to stealth camp there. The Paysons , who apparently own half the valley,were having an employee appreciation celebration at the park and the place was filled with their employees and families. Okay, time to go to plan B, back to boondocking at Paul's place ! I remembered seeing the sign about hot dogs and I told Jim let's go check out the Old Barn and get something for lunch.

I expected a little cafe inside a barn or something like that. What we found was a family trying to add a few dollars to their income by selling hot dogs at their old barn. We thought they looked friendly so we stopped. It was one of the most fun and interesting stops we've made on this trip.
We met Wayne the owner of the property, Delayne (hope I'm spelling it right) his wife and Dallas their nephew who was staying with them for the time being. Oh and yes, the absolutely handsome, Dawson, the Belgian horse.

Wayne has trained Dawson for 13 years and he is the sweetest, most gentle giant I have ever encountered. He just wanted to love on all of us, including Hailey-she was having nothing to do with this very large horse. Wayne's property is adjacent to the town cemetery and he said on several occasions Dawson will be standing by the fence to the cemetery and his ears will perk straight up and he will turn and run like crazy into the barn. Other times, he will come charging out of the barn right up to the fence of the cemetery, come to a grinding stop and just stare. Don't you wonder what he sees that Wayne hasn't.

Delayne told us that Dallas had woken up the other morning and said please tell me you were in my room earlier this morning fussing over me-no she wasn't. So when Wayne offered us a boondocking spot right below the barn,uh no, we passed on it. We didn't need any more excitement than what we had been experiencing on this trip already.

What a wonderful family this is. We spent much longer talking than we had planned out,but we felt like family when we left. And yes, the hot dogs were delicious. This will always be a lesson to me to expect the unexpected and always take the road less traveled and be willing to open yourself up to new experiences.